


A Tale of Lightening; Fragmented Sensation

by beauty_love_stardust



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Barebacking, Comfort/Angst, Declarations Of Love, Depression, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, First Love, First Time, Heavy Angst, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Loss of Virginity, Memory Loss, Sex, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Underage Sex, Vaginal Sex, Virginity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-17
Updated: 2020-01-17
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:41:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22289581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beauty_love_stardust/pseuds/beauty_love_stardust
Summary: I wish she could see me as more than just her geeky big-brother-like-best-friend ... but she can't.Barry has always loved Iris and he should have known better than to let her curl up in his bed ... but he didn't.Warning: Dark Themes portrayed. You've been warned.
Relationships: Barry Allen/Iris West
Comments: 13
Kudos: 35





	A Tale of Lightening; Fragmented Sensation

_**A Tale of Lightening; Fragmented Sensation** _

* * *

> _Everyone is a solid rock_
> 
> _until someone breaks their heart._

* * *

It felt like _**hell**_.

To be ignored. Unnoticed.

I was never the bruiting handsome lover. But the geeky, sublime best friend.

A brother.

That’s how Iris sees me. That is how she has _always_ seen me.

Lanky, towering over her; hovering with a pale complexion, waiting for her to see me as more than just a geek. More than just a shoulder to cry on.

If she knew what I would give to kiss her. Just once. She would know the darkest pieces of me. How often I am in conflict with myself.

Nearly three years I’ve laid in the room next to hers. Fantasized about her touch on my skin. Pictured the kisses we might share in secret. I’d take the punishment from Joe if he caught us.

I’d never look back—never.

Oh, and nights like tonight, when the crackling strikes of lightening illuminate the sky, I know she will come to me. Always me.

Her Bar.

Hers. But never truly **_hers_**.

The terror from those strikes always well within her heart. Causing a panic; a searing terror from within.

“Bar?” Like clockwork, I didn’t even hear her quiet footfalls.

Lifting the covers; it’s an instinct. I let her in, without question. The warm heat of her pressed right to my side, into the nook of my arm, makes my heart leap.

I’ve overheard hushed whispers underneath the jungle gym on the elementary playground. It’s where the cool Freshman boy’s hangout after school. Most of them don’t notice me. I’m invisible to them. Whispers of kisses. Of hands sliding underneath a female’s bra. Some have even whispered about Iris.

I know she’s kissed a boy. I’ve smelled male fragrance on her before. It stung. I can’t deny it does, but I am the coward that never tells the truth. I can’t gather the courage to act.

We’re fourteen.

Time has begun to slip from my grasp.

Freshman, are horny. Especially the boys. I’ve begun to sport erections—have ejaculations in my sleep.

It’s why I should hesitate to have her cuddle so close; but I don’t. I let her stay.

Another clap of thunder has her shiver in my arms. Darkened pools bore into my own, stilling my sporadic heart for an instant.

Her leg lifts, hitching on to my hip. Connecting with the skin exposed from my shirt riding up. Grazing me, just above the waistband of checkered boxers.

I swallow the lump in my throat, because I feel the reaction.

No. Not right now. Please not now.

But it’s too late. I’ve swollen, just there.

My stiffness tented the front of those boxers, pushing up, into her draped thigh, seeking the warmth of her flesh. My erratic heart almost beats clear through my ribcage, and I am thankful for the darkness, as scarlet coats my neck, and cheeks.

She shifts; then notices.

Her back goes rigid, just like mine. Her eyes searching through the darkness, my breath is baited, waiting for her reaction.

The hand that rested instinctively on my chest, over my heart, begins a slow descent downward. Down … down … down.

My breath hitches.

Warm fingertips meet with the offensive piece of me. Her leg shifted down, grazing the tented fabric, before resting just underneath my erection.

“Iris … I ….” What could I say? How could I explain? It’s my body. And she’s like my sister. I shouldn’t react this way.

“I’m sorry, Bar. Do you … want me to go?” She’s searching my expression. Thankfully can’t see how red in the face I am.

“No!” That reaction was instantaneous. I draw her in nearer, keeping my arm snaked around her shoulders. Trying to formulate proper thoughts.

But that devilish hand is still resting just where I am weakest, pushing logical thoughts clear from my mind. One squeeze, and I would fall apart. But she doesn’t squeeze. She’s still grazing me. Still just barely touching.

“I didn’t mean to … You know …” Her words falter.

Of course, she didn’t. It’s **_Iris_**. She could never mean to arouse me. Why would she want to?

“I know,” another quick, shaky response.

I’m mortified.

“It’s a natural, bodily reaction,” she reassures me.

Shouldn’t I be reassuring her? I can’t breathe, though. Can’t formulate words.

Quickly, I nod. Feeling the flame in my cheeks, worsening, as I try to picture something, anything to make it go away.

Frogs. Fish. Cats. Dogs.

Brown eyes. Dark skin. **_Iris_**.

It didn’t work, my mind always came full circle right back to Iris. My first crush. The closest thing to a sister I will ever have.

“Bar?” her voice robs me of my thoughts. And I force my eyes to meet hers.

Then, she squeezes. I jolt slightly. Breathing in, as I pulse in her hand, feeling the need rising, burning right through to my belly, where a coil is tightening inside of me.

“I-Iris,” I forced out the word – her name – but her lips are getting closer. Her breath warmer, and then the space closed between us.

I have to break it down in my mind. I have to understand what exactly is transpiring. Warm petals, hot tongue dragging over my lower one. Begging for entry. My mouth opened, letting her in, it was instinctual. Everything with Iris is pure instinct.

We are far too old to share a bed like this. But it’s given an excuse, even after all these years, for me to hold her. And God, I desperately _want_ to hold her.

I am in complete shock. Stunned by the impulse to deepen the kiss. And when it finally breaks – we are both left breathless.

“Bar …” Iris’s voice is soft, angelic; brimmed with innocence.

My hand trembled so hard I struggled to align it with her cheek. Had this actually happened? I needed to feel her here, warm and soft-skinned, to comprehend it.

I would have denied the attraction I felt. Pushed her away, insisted my erection was that of a teenage boy who rubbed against a girl … that any girl could set me off … but it wouldn’t have been true. Not a word of it. Only Iris could pry this reaction from me; purely Iris.

My heart wanted to sing; but I was also petrified with fear at the same time.

I wanted to say something; but my throat ran dry.

“Why did you do that, Bar?” Iris asked and I couldn’t differentiate uncertainty from the concave of excitement, or was that sadness?”

I was so out of sorts; I couldn’t tell which iris I was hearing. And it was too dark to make out the curves of her cheeks and exact expression in her eyes. I was so close; yet so far.

Was she angry with me?

How could she not be …? I’m her taller, go-to, brother-like-figure. And I just sported an erection, demanded she not leave, kissed her, and pushed my tongue in her mouth … when she crawled into my bed for comfort and sleep.

I felt my gut twist with disgust at myself.

Of course, Iris didn’t want **_that_** … she is sweet and kind and feels sorry for me, because unlike her I’ve never been kissed. Never had anything close …

There’s only **_her_**.

Ashamed and embarrassed I lowered my hand from her cheek. I listened to the rise and fall of her every breath – and wanted to break into tears.

“Mm sorry Iris …” I managed to respond.

If Joe knew about this I’d be in heaps of trouble. He might even disown me entirely.

Iris relinquished her hold on my erection – I’d almost forgot she was holding me, still – and I exhaled.

“I’m the one who should be apologizing, Bar. I climbed into your bed … I suppose we’re too old for such things now. I should have known better.” Iris whispered and my heart obliterated.

Now I _knew_ she regretted it. Regretted **_me_**.

Why couldn’t I love someone else? Anyone else? Why did it **_have_** to be Iris?

That wasn’t what I wanted … these were the only moments I got to hold her in a way that could have been considered sexual. Reserved for couples and married individuals.

I bunched one of my hands into a fist until my nails bit into my palm and I winced. The pain the only thing that grounded me enough not to beg her to stay – **_again_**.

I didn’t say anything … I didn’t trust myself to.

Unprompted, she continued, “I … I’ll let you take care of it, okay, Bar? I’m too old to be afraid … Dad is right.” Joe had been on her about occupying my bed some nights. It wasn’t normal. Not between friends of the opposite sex. He knew it comforted her so he hadn’t been adamant about it. And Iris had defended me; promised it was just between friends. How ridiculous that she couldn’t spend a night in my bed … I am like her brother …

Even that memory **_hurt_**.

I didn’t want to just be Iris’s brother. I _never_ wanted that.

Iris slipped from under the covers and scurried out of my room. I felt the ache in my boxers and I wish I could have told her the truth … but to know I betrayed her trust and our friendship by kissing her like that … it was _unimaginable_.

I buried my face in my pillow, and sobbed.

I wanted to take care of it; that unbeatable throb … but I knew all thoughts would be on Iris and that didn’t feel right.

Not now.

Not with iris across the hall in her own room probably disgusted _with_ me. – **_By_** me.

So, I let the ache continue until I finally fell into a troubled sleep.

I woke to seed coating my boxers and sheets the next morning and regretted my decision not to take care of it the night before; I was too disgusted to touch myself now. I could only think of Iris’ hand right there. Gripping me in confused questioning. And I want her touch more.

I ended up losing the contents of my stomach at the thought.

I had always hoped when I finally got up the nerve to kiss Iris, she would tell me of her feelings. Kiss me back with all the passion I gave and promise it was us against the world. Boyfriend and girlfriend. Bonnie and Clyde.

The truth hurt more. I thought perhaps I was overreacting. I wanted to straighten things out with Iris – but she avoided me.

Endlessly. For the next week.

She shut me out. I barely got a word out of her edgewise.

Only when Joe was around did she carry a conversation and it usually required Joe’s prompting for any conversations to start. I hadn’t just lost a warm body in my bed; I’d lost my best friend. Iris couldn’t even look me in the eyes anymore and it hurt. It was the worst imaginable pain I’d ever known. I’d always been able to count on Iris. She’d always been there and now … now I had no one.

I looked in the mirror and was disgusted by my own reflection.

I saw more and more flaws every day I dared to look.

I saw my high cheekbones, gaunt cheeks, long-face, pale skin, and wiry-physique. As I picked out all of the flaws I could see – imagined and real – I began to descend into self-hatred. I could see why Iris didn’t like me in that way. I was so **_ugly_**. Especially, compared to the other handsome boys in our grade. I saw them flirt with her, and I wanted to make them hurt; but it wasn’t their fault … it was mine.

For loving Iris.

For being such a **_creep_**.

I would have beaten down anyone that did what I had done to her. Probably landed myself in the hospital because I am so damned weak, but I would have challenged any guy that made her so upset.

I saw the look in her eyes. She was solemn when she was home. And though she pretended to be a beacon of light, like before, around other people; that spark never quite met her eye.

And it was _my_ fault.

I felt like my heart had been ripped out and shredded. I couldn’t keep any food down, I could barely stomach going to school at all, and I especially couldn’t bring myself to alleviate my sexual frustrations which consequently left me to awaken in soiled, drenched sheets every morning, and the worst part is that all I wanted was to talk to Iris about it. – But I couldn’t.

I would approach her room and immediately remember … she wasn’t talking to me.

The pain was unbearable.

Even the loss of my parents couldn’t compare to this unrestrainable agony. Iris made me better when I grieved my Mom and Dad. She is the reason I could walk with my head held high and block out the jeers from other kids.

I couldn’t even talk to Joe … what could I say to him about any of this?

_‘Sorry, Joe … I kissed your daughter and sort of got a hard-on while in bed with her, after you expressly warned us about the inappropriateness of sleeping together at our age, by the way I need advice.’_

Even the idea of talking to Joe was cringe-worthy.

After almost a month of Iris shutting me out (and Joe none the wiser) I was at the end of my pitiful rope. I’d lost so much weight my clothes bagged on me. I couldn’t stomach food, couldn’t tolerate another school day where I was forced to watch Iris be fawned over by the other guys at school. And in finality; I couldn’t find a reason why I should have to.

I felt isolated and lonely.

So, fucking **_lonely_**.

Iris didn’t want me anymore. Not as her nerdy big-brother. Not even as just her friend. I made it so she doesn’t trust me. She keeps to her room, away from me. Like the past three years we’d lived under the same roof, never happened.

I started to make cuts on my arms. Little nicks at first with a razor-edge. Just a prick, enough to draw blood. The day after I kissed her. That first time I looked at myself in the mirror and saw how I looked. How I really must look to, Iris. I pricked my pale skin until I bled and scabbed over.

Every day I pricked a little more, until I made full on slices. It didn’t help … but it made my skin as tainted as my mind. It was the only punishment I could inflict on myself. Every day I tried and failed to speak to Iris I dished out further punishment. My body was my own, now. Iris could barely look at me; let alone see under my long-sleeved sweater-vests.

I used to fight back when other kids pushed me into lockers. At the very least I’d pick myself up and shoot a glare, but now, I take those punishments, too. For my hideous taste in clothes. For the stupid, crap haircut I have, for whatever dumb reason the bullies decided I deserved it that day. I took the punishment and thought of Iris.

I didn’t think about how dizzy I felt from not eating that day, or how dark the rings under my eyes became, from the tears I cried every night when I was alone in bed. I just kept going. The hunger pangs kept my focus off of my stiff cock, I had to shift in my baggy pants to hide. And if I needed any further reminders, I could always purposefully stray into the bully’s path. Invoke a response by lingering in their line of sight, until they acted on their worst impulses

After three months of being iced out, I’d not noticed my own decline past ‘not okay’ into ‘deep depression’ and joe and Iris hadn’t either. Joe’s days and nights were spent more and more at the precinct as crime spiked and he barely laid eyes on me for a few minutes a day (if that) and iris avoided me at all costs and was home a lot less, since she apparently had a new boyfriend.

One of the handsome, blue-eyed, blond-haired, jock football players.

Jason Felts.

Iris has always had an in with the popular girls. Despite not being a member of cheerleading or anything close to it. Her passion is writing and journalism. Which explains why she wouldn’t want a science-nerd as her boyfriend. What could I offer her? Nothing about me was worthy of Iris.

The final straw came when I heard gossip between a gaggle of girls and Iris at lunch. I was seated alone; which was usual. Since Iris no longer spoke to me, I had no one to sit with. Sometimes I didn’t even bother to pick up my lunch from the cafeteria and skipped the entire ordeal, but for some reason I’d decided to give it a go.

Iris and her friends laughed and giggled. Jason was a junior whom would travel out for lunch. And in his absence iris would talk about him.

I heard her speak about losing her virginity. That Jason had been with her … **_that_** way.

I didn’t stick around to hear the details. I threw my entire lunch out and heaved up the few scraps I had ate, in the bathroom. I broke into sobs right there in the stall. I couldn’t stop thinking about Iris trading in her v-card to someone she didn’t even know. I returned to that night three months ago when we kissed. When I wanted to tell her the truth, but realized she didn’t want that.

Didn’t want me …

I cried until I couldn’t see through the haze.

And when I could finally pull myself together enough to stand back up, I pretended I was sick and left for home.

I’d never been the kind to cut class, or lie about an illness, but I couldn’t deal.

Iris had to know I heard her. Didn’t she?

I was right there … or had she really become so immune to my presence? Was I really just invisible to her now?

Her pervy big-brother-like, ex best-friend?

I dropped my backpack by the door, kicked off my shoes and slammed into the bathroom.

I glanced at my hollowed, gaunt reflection in the mirror and felt sick all over again.

What was so wrong with me? Why couldn’t she love me?

I despised my skin. My face. My stupid splotchy eyes. The countless scars on my stomach, arms and legs. I’d branched out after the first month. Punishing elsewhere.

No wonder Iris can’t stand to look at me.

I could hear the pump and beat of my heart in my ears. It thudded. I scrambled to make it to my bedroom. Dug in my desk and wormed out a pad of paper. And put a pen to the lines.

I poured my heart out and apologized. For all of it.

For kissing her that night and making her uncomfortable enough to leave. For not gathering up the courage to apologize before now and for how much of a fuck-up I was as a big-brother and best friend. I put my soul into it. Until tears blinded my line of vision and all I could sense in my heart was this unbearable pain. I told her how I couldn’t live this way anymore. And I couldn’t. I didn’t want to try, anymore. I told her that everything I did, I did for her. So, she can feel safe again. And happy. And loved.

Because she doesn’t feel that way around me anymore.

She is repulsed by me.

I stained the paper with my tears and wiped them from my cheeks.

Tucked the letter into an envelope and wrote her name in neat scrawl on the front.

With one last glance around my bedroom I pulled my childhood teddy bear off my bed. Though the bear was badly beaten up (much like I felt) he was the last bit of home I had. One of my few possessions from my childhood, I kept. I’d slept with him every night since Iris stopped talking to me. Mom gave him to me when I was four. I remember her telling me that her father had given Mr. Pilford to her when she was a little girl. And she held him when she was afraid, or sad.

I was well past those emotions but I needed my Mom and Mr. Pilford was as close as I could come, now.

I slipped into Iris’s room and laid the letter down on her pillow. Ventured across to her vanity and smelled the flowery perfumes she’d only just begun to wear, now that we were in high school. I moved on to her closet and looked through her clothes, fondly remembering the days she wore each of the outfits I spied there. Some hadn’t been worn in months, but I could name which outfit had been worn to which event.

I swallowed the thickness in my throat and choked on my own sobs.

She always promised I was her favorite person in the world. That nothing could ever make her hate me. She lied. She lied so many times that I hate myself for believing that she was telling me the truth.

I’d never know what happened to Mom. Who killed her … It would remain a mystery forever. No one believed me regardless. I was deemed crazy for what I believed that I witnessed. And maybe I was. Why would anyone ever choose to believe me? Why should they?

Tired. I headed for the bathroom and this time, clicked the lock.

I held Mr. Pilford tight to my chest. Looked deep into the mirror and saw myself for the hundredth time as Iris must see me.

Vile. Disgusting. I loathed myself.

I smashed my fist into the mirror and it shattered into pieces. I watched as the shards clattered into the sink bowl, unmoved.

I didn’t care that my knuckles bled from the cut of glass. I barely felt it. I was numb.

I opened the medicine cabinet and pulled out Joe’s sleeping pills. And almost in a trance, lifted one of the glass shards out of the sink.

I stepped into the bathtub and downed as many of the pills as I could swallow. My gag reflex was set off a couple of times but I (for once) kept my stomach from bringing them back up.

I curled into a ball in the tub. And clung to Mr. Pilford until my head became woozy. And just when I was struggling to keep my eyes open, I dragged the mirror shard across my wrist, as an added safeguard to make certain, this was the end.

As the world grew dark and the lights faded away, my last conscious thought was of how much I loved Iris. And how much I wished; I was enough for her.

* * *

Hard, coarse leather was the first thing I felt. The material was latched around my wrists and ankles. I felt loopy and sick. I could see light. Felt it there … so much light …

And just as quickly it faded out.

Was darkness all I would have? From now on?

I came awake again and felt that firm leather … it was still there.

Still attached to me like moths to a light-beam.

What was happening?

I came to enough to recognize that I wasn’t in heaven, or whatever afterlife we shuffled off to. No. I wasn’t so lucky.

The assault of antiseptic and the discomfort of an IV was pricked into my arm. When I made to move my arms and legs, I realized I was restrained. Confined. Unable to move.

My tongue felt like cotton. I must have been sedated … How long though?

There was a white bandage on my arm and Mr. Pilford was nowhere in sight. Just blinding white lights and to my horror, a tearful Iris perched in a chair next to my bed.

I could smell her perfume. See the solemn smile, she forced when she realized I’d opened my eyes.

I never meant to do that again. Never.

“Bar?” I flinched as she used **_that_** name.

She hadn’t called me Bar since before … since I **kissed** her.

When she spoke to me after it was always, Barry.

I felt her hand slide into mine and I wanted to tug away but I couldn’t move an inch in any direction.

Seeming to sense I wasn’t going to respond she continued, unprompted, “I read the letter you wrote me, Bar—” Another hard flinch. “—Why didn’t you tell me? If I’d known ….” Iris trailed off. “Oh, Bar … when I saw you like that … I thought … I thought I lost you …”

I couldn’t take it. I leaned to the side and started to heave. I had only water and acid in my stomach. It came up onto the edge of the sheets. I couldn’t lean over enough to aim over the railing of the bed.

I couldn’t bear to hear her words. They hurt me too deeply.

Joe came into view and Iris broke into sobs and nuzzled into Joe’s chest.

I jerked in my restraints. I wanted to be free. I needed to be out of them … I didn’t like the way I felt in them.

How pathetic. How helpless …

“Don’t fight, Bar. You’ll only make it worse!” Joe piped up this time and I broke into sobs.

“I didn’t want to be saved! Why did you save me?! Why?!” I lashed out in frustration and I struggled until the cuffs chafed and the nurses rushed in, pricked a needle in my IV and my mind fell away, again.

Why were they doing this to me?

Time elapsed.

I wasn’t allowed out of the hospital. They transported me to a mental health facility, via ambulance. Away from Iris, away from Joe … away from my life. Not that I wanted it anymore. And into the uncomfortable white rooms made so that I couldn’t try to harm myself again.

I lost my mind when I was told I couldn’t have Mr. Pilford with me. Any foreign object was too dangerous. Patients earned privileges and I hadn’t earned any.

They had to sedate me for the first week. I had a meltdown when they refused me, Mr. Pilford. The nurses were curt and cruel. Most chided me, told me I’d done this to myself. I hadn’t. I just wanted to be free of the hurt.

I had been crushed under it all.

And Iris … I hadn’t talked to her since I woke up in the hospital the first time.

Joe had sent her away, believing her presence would only upset me more. And it had.

Though not for the reasons Joe believes.

I was force-fed when I refused to eat. It was always unpleasant when they went to such lengths. Restraining me, pushing a tube down my throat to force the food in.

In the end it always came back up anyway.

I refused to talk. To anyone.

I didn’t quite remember what my own voice sounded like after a few weeks of refusing to use it. All I had left was my free will. The will to choose what I said.

I couldn’t decide anything else. Everything was decided for me.

The drugs they forced upon me were so strong I could barely keep my head right. My hands shook so badly I couldn’t even hold a cup. I tried to do math in my head, science algorithms, anything to stop my mind from slipping. Electro-shock therapy always came with a steep price. The doctor told Joe it would calm me down. It had that effect.

One was to make the shaking bad enough to prevent me from writing (not that they offered me a pen and paper mind) and the other was to rob me of all thought entirely.

I didn’t think about Iris anymore. I didn’t get hard and spill seed whilst I slept anymore. I didn’t do math or science in my head. I could barely remember my name most days. I just gave in. I let them do what they pleased. I talked when I could … I slept when I could. I cried until I ran out of tears. It’s all I could do.

I wanted to die, more than I’d ever wanted it before. I knew what it was like now … what it was like to truly have nothing. That place showed me true rock bottom.

I was calm and compliant so they gave me privileges. Let me out of my room. I would wander aimlessly and plop in the common room. Shake and twitch as I tried to remember more about me, through the fuzz of drugs and shocks.

I was granted Mr. Pilford … but by then I couldn’t remember why I’d wanted him.

I don’t remember when the doctor said I could leave. I just remember it happened.

And I didn’t leave my room for a week after I got home. I slept, used the bathroom, ate, and repeated the process.

Like a zombie … because of the medicine.

I didn’t want to cut anymore. I didn’t want to die anymore … I didn’t want anything anymore.

I just existed.

Sometimes I felt warm, soft hands in my hair. And heard a string of apologizes and promises. I didn’t hold on to them. I did lean into the touch though.

It had been so long since anyone had touched me with the intent to love, rather than hurt. All I’d know was hurt in that place. Nurses bruised me everywhere, conceivable. None had been gentle or kind.

I wet the bed sometimes. I didn’t wake up, when I was exhausted. Joe would help me to the shower and strip my sheets. Those were the only times I felt embarrassed. If I could even grasp onto an emotion for that long, that is.

Emotions got me in this mess in the first place. I was better off without them.

Wasn’t I?

* * *

I cracked my eyes open. Was it the middle of the night?

Moonbeams shined through the windowpane and I felt my chest tweak with a memory … stars, night sky, Iris … I hummed in my throat.

Then made to realize a hunched figure was smoothing my hair to one side on my forehead.

I felt a little bit clearheaded. I knew who was there without a lick of uncertainty, for the first time since I came home.

 _Iris_.

“Iris …?” Her name came out in one big slur. My voice sounded strange, even to my own ears.

“Bar? I’m right here.” Her hand was warm and inviting. I wanted to feel that touch everywhere. I hummed in a vibration and sigh.

Iris climbed up onto my bed and tucked under the covers with me. Her body heat felt good. I sighed again, in contemplative bliss.

“Dad took you off the medicines … they weren’t helping you. You couldn’t even talk.” She whispered, and I recognized the crack of tears in her voice.

“Hmm … made me tired … mind foggy …” I strung a few words together; it felt like rocket science, though.

Iris nodded, her agreement, “Bar? Do you know how long it’s been since you took all those pills and made this …?” Iris dragged her thumbpad over the deep gouge of a white-ridged scar on my wrist.

I shook my head, no.

“It’s been almost five months, Bar …” she breathed.

Five months? I couldn’t comprehend that. “It’s June, Bar.”

That meant I was fifteen. I spent my birthday in that place. I shuddered.

I’d missed five months of school? Life?

“Oh …” I couldn’t gather myself enough to say more. I was still so tired, despite having a clear-head.

“Bar … Why did you do this to yourself …?” Iris’ voice cracked and trembled, “I never wanted you gone, Bar … I thought you were angry with me. You didn’t talk to me for a long time …” Iris sighed.

I made to tilt my head. Everything was so hazy. I don’t know … why did I do this?

“Iris … Hm … I love you …” And I did. That emotion came to the forefront, so I put it in words.

Iris’s tears fell, in fat-drops down her cheek and conglomerated at her chin. “I love you too, Bar. I’ve always loved you.”

I fell back to sleep with the weave of her fingers in my hair and her name on my tongue.

* * *

The next time I cracked open my eyes the fog had cleared entirely. And Iris was there; curled up and fast asleep by my side. Mr. Pilford in her arms.

“Iris?” I said, as the fogginess cleared my mind. It was dark, shadows were encroached on my room, but it was; my room.

I would have recognized the disorganized, disarray of stuff, anywhere.

I was no longer so thick in the weave of fog. I felt clear-headed, but I knew I still had damage. I lifted my hand to touch her arm and it shook, unbearably.

I withdrew it before I could so much as graze her skin as I remembered one thing, with particular clarity: Iris loved me like a sister loves her brother.

If she even still loved me at _all_.

Iris crinkled her brow and opened her eyes in answer to my soft utterance.

“Bar?” she asked, uncertainty in her voice. After a split second of realization – she speared forward in a jolt and wrapped me in her arms.

It had been so long since I could feel. Since I could talk a sentence, or hear her voice without the shadow of a haziness behind it, that I almost didn’t believe it was happening.

I drank in the lingering scent of her perfume and another potent scent that was uniquely Iris – the Iris I remembered.

Her ribs poked my fingers and I noticed how thin she was. Worry reflected in her eyes when she pulled back from my arms.

“I’ve missed you, Bar …” her voice echoed excitement, but there was still a distinct hollowness behind it, I couldn’t quite unscramble.

I missed her in my bed, more than I could ever belay to her before I went through with the ploy to end my life. I could remember a haze of disconnect from the way I was before, to who I became as a drugged, electro-shocked, zombie.

I gave up so much, for release that never came.

“Why?” I finally asked her.

I remembered the way she ignored me before. I remembered the kiss that I stole from her. My first and only kiss. The price of which, was to cost me the last eight months with her.

She appeared taken aback. “You’ve been gone for so long, Bar … Even when I talked to you … in that … that place … you weren’t really there. And I’ve missed you. I’ve missed my _brother_ , my **_friend_** … I’ve missed **_you_** , Bar.”

I blinked back tears as I remembered bits and pieces of her, conglomerated in with everything else. I remembered how long that I was in love with her. How long I craved to hold her in my arms. Even with so much of me stripped away, I knew that I loved her.

I swallowed, “You stopped talking to me. You … you shut me out … I …” I strained to find words that I wanted to say, but my brain came up short and blanked out.

I blinked and swallowed the emotion clogged in my throat.

“Bar … I thought you hated me for what I did … I … we crossed a line that night …” her eyes welled with tears as her voice cracked.

I was so fractured from the drugs that had been forced upon me that I could hardly recall the night that started all of this. I remembered the thunder, the lightening. I even remembered the warm allure of her frame as she speared a thigh over one of my own. The warmth that I felt inside, when she sucked my lips and tangled her tongue with mine … I had held on to that. And hated myself for it.

I’ve wanted to touch Iris since we were _ten_. I’ve wanted to kiss her – to be with her sexually – since _then_. I’d never wanted her as a sister, but I had her as one all the same.

But my mind couldn’t attach to all of these emotions, the electricity that had been jolted through me in that place, took so much … so _many_ things from me.

“You gave your virginity to someone else …” It wasn’t my business, it never had been, but that was the tipping point. The reason I wanted to leave the world behind. Iris had so easily slung herself on another man’s arm. _That_ I **could** remember. That was one of the _first_ memories that returned.

“Bar … I … I _didn’t_ … I just told my friends that … I … I wanted to make you jealous … I knew you were listening … I just … I thought it would make you _react_ … that you would **_talk_** to me … I didn’t think it would –” Iris choked on her tears and squeezed Mr. Pilford to her chest, “I should have seen how messed up you were, Bar … I should have _known_ what I did … I’m sorry … I’m _always_ going to be so … _so_ sorry …” Iris sobbed into Mr. Pilford’s fur and I watched her in slow recognition.

I’d given up more than just a part of myself. I realized I would never become the man I was on route to be before.

I’m disgusting. Damaged. So much is wrong with me.

Even my fingers can’t stop trembling.

Yet …

Iris is confessing her love to me. **_For_** me. And I want to **_feel_** it, but I can barely feel anything at all.

I inched toward her and wrapped her in my arms. I let her sob into my nightshirt. Let her push forward until she was right against my front and despite my want to be close to her – despite all of it – I didn’t harden in my boxers.

I didn’t react like I did the night of the thunderstorm. The night I ruined **_us_** , forever.

I just laid there – and held her.

I wanted to remember why I needed Iris, I wanted to remember how it felt to have all of my faculties; my wits. But I was slow. And despite being alert, I was still so disconnected.

So, confused.

Iris craned her neck up to look me in the eyes. “Bar… that night … I wanted you to beg me to stay. I wanted you to steal another kiss … to tell me you were in love with me and that is why you kissed me … I would have stayed. I would have given you **_all_** of myself .... I only climbed into your bed, because I liked the way it felt when I was wrapped in your arms. I haven’t been afraid of thunderstorms in a long time, Bar.”

Every word she spoke was in league with what I wanted to hear from her **before**. I listened to the tone of her voice, the certainty of her muscles … and I felt joy, but I also felt _pain_.

So **_much_** pain.

Being able to feel so little, with Iris in my arms, made me wish that I had died all over again.

Why was the universe cruel enough to give me the girl I’ve loved since I knew what love was, only to steal away my ability to return her affections properly, with the same magnitude she provided them?

“Iris …” I didn’t know how to articulate what I felt.

I wanted to use big words, but they wouldn’t come to mind.

I sighed, frustrated, as I leaned my forehead against hers, in quiet resolve.

“I wish you’d let me die …” I grazed her waist with my fingertips and ached to feel her; ached to _remember_ everything more clearly.

Her expression darkened as my words sighed against her neck.

“Bar … why would you say that …?” she withdrew from my arms and clutched Mr. Pilford tighter to her chest.

I swallowed, “Because … you have no idea … no idea what it’s felt like … these past months … without you.” I struggled to talk, “five months you said …” I managed to remember with difficulty, “They hurt me … they took _everything_ from me, I can barely **think** straight, Iris … and I … I can’t stop my hands … they shake …” I showed her the tremors of my hand. I closed my eyes and breathed out a deep breath of air.

“And my mind … I can’t remember things … important things …” I swallowed around the tremors in my voice, “They punished me … with shocks if I didn’t eat … if I … If I didn’t **_obey_** …” I could see the build-up of horror in her eyes, bit by bit, by the second.

“Bar—”

I shook my head, “You say you love me … you’re _in_ love with me. But I … I don’t remember how _that_ felt … I **know** I love you, Iris … I **_know_** that … I just … they made it so I couldn’t feel … I **_can’t_** feel … I’m so _numb_ … and I just don’t want to be here … like _this_ …”

I lowered my eyes and traced the scar on my wrist. The mark was a heavy reminder of what I did to myself. The nurses told me that **_I_** did this; no one else. It’s all _my_ fault.

I wanted to be free. I didn’t want to feel like Iris’ creepy adopted brother and ex-best friend anymore.

And I didn’t … I felt like an unimportant, _nobody_ to her.

Iris reached out, latched her fingers around my wrist and drew my hand away from tracing the mark. Without fault she dipped down her head. Kissed the mark with certainty and love. Then lowered my wrist and inched back into my arms, setting aside Mr. Pilford.

Her hands made to lay on my chest. One, just over my heartbeat.

“I’m sorry, Bar. I’m sorry they did this to you,” she let her breath tickle my lips and I shivered up my spine, “and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that night, that I _love_ you. That I **_need_** you.”

I closed my eyes as I felt one of her hands caress my cheek.

I barely felt the drag against my seared nerve-endings. I basked in the need I felt to have more. To be **_her_** Barry again.

“But I won’t let you give up. Not ever again, Bar,” she vowed with a nudge of her nose to my cheek.

I whimpered in mournful aches.

“You’ll be **able** to feel again. And I’ll help you with the tremors. We can build up your mind … your _muscles_. Remember when Dad tried to teach you to fight with training mitts? Hm? I’ll practice with you, Bar,” she promised.

I closed my eyes and shivered again as she ignited the fuzzy memory to come to the forefront of my mind. It was vague, hazy – but real.

“I remember,” I managed to whisper.

“Good. You’ll regain your strength, Bar. The medicine might not fully be worn off just yet,” she coaxed, but I didn’t believe it was solely the medicine that caused my slower-than-usual cognitive state. Not as I recalled everything thereafter.

“Iris … I don’t think it’s the medicine … I’m not **_fixable_** …” I tried to drive home my point as I struggled to cup her cheek around my tremor-laden fingers.

She lowered my hand from her cheek and kissed each of my knuckles, individually, her muddy pools refusing to leave mine. She propped herself up on her elbow in order to make her way into an upright position.

With a single, fluid movement she shed off the oversize shirt, I only just realized was one of mine – and slid her panties down her thighs.

I made to stop her with my hand, “Iris … **_Joe_** —”

“—Is _working_ ,” she finished my sentence, “and he left me to look after you, which is what I’m going to do,” she whispered against my lips.

I felt a swelter of heat burn in my stomach as I took in the sight of Iris’ dark-caramel skin. The moonlit glow translucent on her complexion. Despite the simmer of heat, I was still incapable of overcoming the numbness that was spread elsewhere.

Even as she made to lay back down beside me, front to front, the peaks of her budded breasts poking me through the front of my shirt.

Again, she guided my hands up to touch her, this time, I could feel the bareness of her warmth in the shadow of my bedroom.

“Iris …” I sighed unable to grasp words.

“I’ll just have to give your brain a little _nudge_ to access the things you’ve forgotten,” Iris mused. Her soft petals brushed against my lips in concentration.

“You’re still a teenage boy … last time just the _brush_ of my knee excited you, remember?” iris teased against my chapped lips.

I did remember, despite the loopy-swirl of everything around me. I was still at a disconnect, but I didn’t want to be. I wanted to sink into her – and feel the warmth; the realness of her skin. The dalliance of her breath – I **_wanted_** Iris.

She grazed a hand down across my boxers; touched my flaccid bulge from where it was nestled against my thigh.

“Are you numb, even here, Bar?” Iris questioned with a husky-pull in her vocal cords, “Can you **_feel_** me?”

I could almost smell the musk of her arousal in the air, hear the tiniest hitch in her every breath – and feel the pertinence in her touch as her fingers grazed my manhood.

“iris I …” I was at a loss for words. Part of me unable to believe that my Iris was here. She was in my bed and she was touching me – trying to _fix_ me – and the damage I’d inflicted upon myself when I tried to end my life … determined, **_loving_** , Iris.

Frustration seeped into my every crevice and concave. I wanted to tell her I could be fixed; I wanted to _be_ fixed, but I couldn’t believe it was possible. Not even with her touch and her kisses. Not even with her so close, so beautiful, against me.

“Barely, Iris … Just _barely_ …” I whispered.

I heard her release of breath, heavy, and solemn in her throat as she slid her hand underneath the precipice of cloth and warmth that made up my boxers, in order to brush the mushroom-tip of my cock. She dragged her thumb back and forth over the mast, rolling circles that teased and tickled, a bit.

I sucked in air, because this is what I wanted. I’ve always wanted her like this.

Willing, ready, **_touching_** me.

God, I’d never wanted anything more.

Suddenly, she was kissing me. Extensive, loving kisses, that sucked deep into the curve of my neck and met my throat in wet licks and sucks. My eyes fell closed as she touched my chest through my shirt with her fingers, kneaded the skin, just over my nipple until it puckered into a point.

And I reacted with whines of longing in my throat.

“Forgive me, Bar … let me **_fix_** you … let me _try_ … please … **_please_** …” her voice turned throaty and desperate. I could feel her pepper of kisses rise and meet with my lips before finding another patch of my skin to wet and lick.

I knew that I _loved_ her. I’ll **_always_** know that I love her – that could _never_ change – and despite what I’d lost, I felt the burden I placed on her shoulders. In her desperation, I could practically experience the months of her heartbreak and fear for my sanity – my safety – for myself. There was so much all pent-up and sealed into one kiss, one _spew_ of dialect.

“Okay Iris … _okay_ …” I sighed, overwhelmed by the contact and her kisses.

Despite my varied numbness, I could feel the build-up of friction from her hurried touches. I bucked forward into the frenzied force of her fingers and sighed into her skin.

I helped (with minimal difficulty) Iris shed off my grey, nightshirt and checkered-plaid, boxers.

In one breath she was bare and against me and I could feel her up the entirety of my body – my _skin_. I shivered in disbelief as I let our lips touch and graze over one another. I felt her hand reconnect with my manhood and hissed at the foreign sensation.

I wasn’t fully numb, but partially numb – as though I were in a bubble, feeling sensation through an invisible layer of matter.

“What about _now_ , Bar?” Iris tickled kisses and breath across my neck.

I didn’t answer her verbally; I couldn’t piece together the proper words. Rather, I leaned in, connecting our lips in a fire of passionate need. Despite the lack of sensation, I’d been untouched for eight months and she was right – my appetite for intercourse had mounted.

I was **_still_** a teenage boy.

My body answered in my stead, the tip of my penile-length, met with the bone-thin front of her abdomen. Our bared skin the extra push I’d needed to sport a full erection.

The aches and her urgencies too much for my addled mind to ignore.

Iris rolled upon her back, thighs splaying open to form a cocoon around my waist, as I was drawn atop her, by her tight-grasped hands.

I reconnected our lips, made a few ruts against her slick-folds and drank her in. The repressed heat that had built inside me for all those months was determined to burst out. The longer I was awake, the further I came into alertness.

Iris was my dream come true, and always would be; I just wish it were under the weight of less drastic circumstances. I wish I didn’t have to carve apart so much of myself to finally connect with her. I wish I’d read the signs she had desperately conveyed. How could I have been so foolish? – How could I have failed so directly?

Iris let her fingers dig and trace over my nonexistent biceps, past the seepage of bones from under my skin, along the curve of my peck. It was as though she had resolved to retain every conceivable inch of my opaque skin to memory – and perhaps she _had_.

I wasn’t skilled with my kisses (not as she was) but I sought to learn as I practiced. Moved my jaw in slow-worked motions in order to derive better access inside her mouth.

Her fingers glided up and found a way into my dark hazelnut-hair with practiced ease, while the other snaked around my erection, guided the leaky-head to her entrance.

“Please … Barry …” she half-moaned her desperation and I cleaved-apart.

I spread her around my length and recognized the tear of skin around me – her hymen – I realized, coupled with the too-tight sensation of her walls clamped around me.

I could feel **_that_**.

It was like a freight train had barreled down on this single part of me.

I’d never experienced **_anything_** so potent – so _raw_ …

Sweat stuck our fronts together as I worked my hips, angling inside of her, sloppily.

I was a wreck of need and tremors. I couldn’t _stop_ the trembling.

I practically vibrated with the tremors that mounted when I was nervous or scared. Right then, I was a mixture of both.

“God … _Iris_ …” I managed to whimper and she bit my lips in her bid to respond.

“I’m not _fragile_ … you won’t **break** me. I _trust_ you, Bar. Don’t hold back …” she pleaded – and I **_didn’t_**.

I drove my hips to work into the mattress, frenzied with previously repressed emotions I listened to the sloshy-wet sound of our apexes joining over and over, with every beat of my hips.

For a split second, I imagined what might have occurred had it been _that_ night. Amidst the clashes of thunder and spatter of lightening, with our kisses aligned, and my tremors nonexistent. Before my mind was contorted – forever obliterated. I wished I could go _back_.

I wished for a do-over.

I’d have done it all so **differently**.

But this was _all_ I had.

Iris’s all-encompassing warmth, the encouragement from her lips to compel me onward, and fleeting memories of a past that felt extensively vague – and encroached with dark shadows I’d rather forget.

Coaxed by her kisses, I was scorched through to the bone with stirrings of euphoric pleasure. And I lost myself to it.

The push and pull of every thrust, the tangle of our limbs as the sloppiness gave way to the pent-up urgency that had laid dormant inside of me, all those months in hell.

I was suddenly entirely aware of just how much I needed what Iris offered me. I wasn’t ashamed for the first time; I was emboldened, driven to the heights of temptation.

Another few quick paces and I felt the explosion in my lower-half. I half-collapsed on top of her as I roughly connected with her lips in a rush of passion, while seed spurted out into Iris. The mildly numb pulse pumped squirt after squirt and I sighed into her mouth.

When suddenly; her walls clenched around my length in her own build, then release. My entire body was in a tremor. I couldn’t prevent the spasms, and I pushed my face into her neckline to hide the first wave of shame that hit, since I pushed inside of her.

The elation faded and reality came back – ten-fold.

Enough to hit me, square in the chest and drive out all the pleasant sensation to fill the left-behind void, with all the momentarily-suppressed bad, instead.

My limbs were floppy and useless in the aftermath of our love-making. Every bit of energy had been drained from my muscles, and for a moment I saw a flicker of being strapped down to a hospital gurney. Electricity coursing through every vein, nerve, and muscle – destroying brain cells and memories in its wake.

I blinked and focused my vision on Iris.

Beautiful, perfect, Iris.

And I couldn’t believe she’d given herself to me.

I slid out of her, struggled to lay alongside her, rather than awkwardly on-top.

“Bar?” Iris’s voice laced with concern, “Are you okay?”

I heaved a breath of air from my lungs, felt the deflation and clenched my jaw tight. I didn’t want to answer, my mind was in tatters. I felt whole and broken all at once. Functioning … and not.

“I don’t know how … how to be okay …” I struggled to answer. Just that train of thought made my head hurt.

How could she look at me and see her, ‘Bar’ when I could barely even see a fuzzy memory of who I was, before?

“Oh, Bar …” iris whispered in understanding. Like an angel she sought to shed light on my darkened edges and bring forth some resemblance of the boy I should have been. She lifted her hand and tucked our fingers together. Entwined, tight and squeezed my hand, instinctively.

“You’ll be okay, again. Because I’ll be here to pull you through … I’ll help you until you know how it feels to be okay. And I’ll never pull away again,” she promised wistfully.

“What if it’s too late …? What if I’m already too far gone?” I dared to whisper.

Her brows drew close together and fingers rubbed my knuckles. “You’re not, Bar. As long as you’re still breathing, I won’t give up hope.”

I sighed and she kissed me chastely.

“I was so smart … before … I don’t think I’ll ever be that again …” It was a slow realization but I realized I wouldn’t be able to become a CSI like I’d dreamed. And I would never find out what became of my mother.

“You will, Bar. I’ll help you study. The doctor said it might take time for you to regain certain skills,” she reasoned.

“The same doctor that did this to me?” I countered.

Her eyes shifted downward, hesitantly.

“Bar … I … We thought we lost you … and when you were so adamant … so **_insistent_** that you didn’t want to live anymore … Dad didn’t know what else to do. The doctor promised it would calm you down … make you better … we never would have let them …” she choked up, “If we thought for a minute it would—” she cut herself off, covering her mouth with her hand, a low sob muffled into it.

“Bar I’m so sorry …” she apologized, as if it were all her own doing. As if she’d pulled the lever that amped up the electricity, herself.

I held her while she sobbed and let my tremors abate, subtly over the course of a few minutes.

“It’s not your fault,” I sighed into her hair.

“It **_is_** , Bar … I _found_ you. I … I went home too, when you didn’t show up to our next period, I was worried. And I … I found you in the tub … you were so _cold_ … you were barely breathing. I called for help and held you till help arrived. I remember the blood, and how much you trembled in my arms, Bar. You _woke_ up … just for a second and you said my _name_ … you were crying and I was just pleading for you to **stay** with me … I was _so_ scared … your heart stopped twice in the **ambulance** … I watched them pump your stomach … I watched them _resuscitate_ you … I had found your letter … when I went to change before I followed you into the **ambulance** … I read it. I read everything you wrote and I’ll _never_ forgive myself. Not for **any** of it … I never want you to feel that way, Bar. I was _never_ disgusted by you. Never. I never _hated_ you, either.” I listened to her words with a heavy heart.

I was so ashamed of my own actions. I was so selfish to think that I could leave Iris alone. That I could leave her behind.

I swept away every tear that streaked down her face. I kissed the salty-tang of her cheek and pushed my tongue into her mouth as I stole a kiss. I wanted to mend what I’d broken in her.

I was determined to erase the bad as best I could.

I couldn’t think about the sheer terror that Iris must have _endured_ while I was unconscious. I was ashamed and heart-wrenched by just the simple thought of it.

She retracted, only to reach to the side and draw Mr. Pilford from where he’d been discarded.

“I found Mr. Pilford in your arms, Bar. You were curled up with him in a ball … I thought … I thought you had died … for that first second I thought you’d died here … alone …” she stopped herself, “you told me to take care of him for you … it was the last thing you said to me before you passed out again on me, just before the ambulance arrived …”

I felt my gut churn with sympathy for Iris. I couldn’t imagine my reaction if the roles had been reversed.

“Mom gave Mr. Pilford to me,” I could see the memory. It was fuzzy – but there. In the dark enclosure of shadows, I’d been afraid. I might have been six … I remembered the hazy shape of my mother, hunched over me, singing – and I remembered she stroked my hair and told me to hold Mr. Pilford tight and she’d be there with me. Dad thought I was too old to crawl into their bed and sleep … so Mr. Pilford had been my solace, instead.

I remembered a brief flash – a _glimmer_ – from the day I choose to end my life.

“I wanted her with me … I wanted her near when I …” my voice cracked.

Iris’s face fell and I leaned forward and she gradually fell into a descent of tears in my arms.

I felt her shoulders shake, I glided my fingers through her mussed-up mane, then kissed her forehead in a brief attempt to assuage her.

“I’ll **_fix_** you, Bar … I broke you … and I will make it right …” she vowed.

I stole another kiss. “You didn’t _break_ me. I broke myself. I should have just kissed you that night … I shouldn’t have cared … I don’t remember _why_ I did … I don’t know if I’ll **_ever_** remember all of it … I just … I know I love you, Iris. I’ll _always_ know I love you,” I sighed.

Iris looked at me with those big, dark-brown eyes in the dark and I knew that my heart would be sealed with hers, everyday for the rest of my life, when she said: “And I’ll always know that I love you, Bar. Don’t you _ever_ forget it, this time.”

And it wasn’t long after that, that she finally calmed enough to sleep, naked in my arms, trussed up against my side, and I could hear the crackle of a thunderstorm beginning just outside the window in the midnight sky – and she nestled close and before long, I too, was _sound_ asleep.

And I was suddenly unafraid of things to come; because one thing I knew indefinitely.

Iris West would always love me. And I would always love Iris West.

And as long as I could hold on to that … I could regain _everything_ I lost. And I could have the life, I wanted, with her at my hip.


End file.
